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Opinion of O'Connor, J.
"relates" to airline rates, routes, or services. Thus, where the terms of a private contract relate to airline rates and services, and those terms can only be enforced through state law, Morales is indistinguishable. As Justice Stevens persuasively argues, there is "no reason why a state law requiring an airline to honor its contractual commitments is any less a law relating to its rates and services than is a state law imposing a 'duty not to make false statements of material fact or to conceal such facts,' " ante, at 236.
As the Court recognizes, ante, at 234, n. 9, my view of Morales does not mean that personal injury claims against airlines are always pre-empted. Many cases decided since Morales have allowed personal injury claims to proceed, even though none has said that a State is not "enforcing" its "law" when it imposes tort liability on an airline. In those cases, courts have found the particular tort claims at issue not to "relate" to airline "services," much as we suggested in Morales that state laws against gambling and prostitution would be too tenuously related to airline services to be preempted, see Morales, supra, at 390. E. g., Hodges v. Delta Airlines, Inc., 4 F. 3d 350, 353-356 (CA5 1993) (arguing that " 'services' is not coextensive with airline 'safety,' " so safety-related tort claim should not be pre-empted; urging en banc review to bring Circuit precedent into conformity with that view), rehearing en banc granted, 12 F. 3d 426 (1994); Public Health Trust v. Lake Aircraft, Inc., 992 F. 2d 291, 294-295 (CA11 1993) (tort claim for defective aircraft design not pre-empted because not related to airline services); Cleveland v. Piper Aircraft Corp., 985 F. 2d 1438, 1443, and n. 11, 1444, n. 13 (CA10) (same), cert. denied, 510 U. S. 908 (1993); Stagl v. Delta Air Lines, Inc., 849 F. Supp. 179, 182 (EDNY 1994) (tort claim against airline for personal injury not pre-empted because not related to airline "services" within the meaning of § 1305); Curley v. American Airlines, Inc., 846 F. Supp. 280, 284 (SDNY 1994) (same); Bayne v. Adventure Tours USA, Inc., 841 F. Supp. 206 (ND Tex. 1994)
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